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skins or their features or their clothing. These pale ones were Torovan, from the east. These others were from the south, from Condigeo. These with noses like an eagle’s beak came from farther yet: Atlantean refugees. Each spoke his own tongue, and each mangled the Lordkin speech in a different fashion. And others, from places Whandall had never heard of.
    Serpent’s Walk watched, and met afterward in the shells of burned buildings. They asked themselves and each other,
What does this one have that would be worth gathering?
But Whandall sometimes wondered,
Does that one come from a more interesting place than here? or more exciting? or better ruled? or seeking a ruler?

C HAPTER
3

    When he was eleven years old, Whandall asked Wanshig, “Where can I find a Lord?”
    â€œYou know where Pelzed lives—”
    â€œA real Lord.”
    â€œDon’t talk like that,” Wanshig said, but he grinned. “Do you remember when those people came to the park? And made speeches? Last fall.”
    â€œSure. You gathered some money in the crowd and bought meat for dinner.”
    â€œThat
was a Lord. I forgot his name.”
    â€œWhich one? There were a lot of people—”
    â€œGuards, mostly. And lookers, and storytellers. The one that stood on the wagon and talked about the new aqueduct they’re building.”
    â€œOh.”
    â€œThe Lords live on the other side of the valley, in the Lordshills mostly. It’s a long way. You can’t go there.”
    â€œDo they have a band?”
    â€œSort of. They have guards, big Lordsmen. And there’s a wall.”
    â€œI’d like to see one. Up close.”
    â€œSometimes Lords go to the docks. But you don’t want to go there alone,” Wanshig said.
    â€œWhy not?”
    â€œIt’s Water Devils territory. The Lords say anyone can go there, and the Devils have to put up with that, but they don’t like it. If they catch youalone with no one to come back and tell what happened, they may throw you in the harbor.”
    â€œBut Water Devils don’t go into the Lordshills, do they?”
    â€œI don’t know. Never needed to find out.”
    How do you know what you need to find out until you know it?
Whandall wondered, but he didn’t say anything. “Is there a safe way to the harbor?”
    Wanshig nodded. “Stay on Sanvin Street until you get past those hills.” He pointed northwest. “After that there aren’t any bands until you get to the harbor. Didn’t used to be. Now, who knows?”
    The forest had fingers: hilltop ridges covered with touch-me and lord-kin’s-kiss that ran from the sea back into the great trees with their deadly guards. There were canyons and gaps through the hills, but they were filled with more poisonous plants that grew back faster than anyone could cut them. Only the hills above the harbor were cleared. Lords lived up there. When the winds blew hard so that the day was clear, Whandall could see their big houses. The adults called them palaces.
    Whandall pointed toward the Lordshills. “Does anyone gather there during a Burning?”
    Wanshig squinted. “Where? On Sanvin Street?”
    â€œNo, up there. The palaces.”
    â€œThat’s where the Lords live. You can’t gather from Lords!”
    â€œWhy not?”
    â€œYangin-Atep,” Wanshig said. “Yangin-Atep protects them. People who go up there to gather just don’t come back. Whandall, they’re Lords. We’re Lordkin. You just don’t. There’s no Burning up there either. Yangin-Atep takes care of them.”
    At dawn he snatched half a loaf from the Placehold kitchen and ate it as he ran. The energy boiling in him was half eagerness, half fear. When it faded, he walked. He had a long way to go.
    Sanvin Street wound over the low hills that separated Tep’s Town from the harbor. At first there were burned-out shells of houses, with some of the